• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, June 15, 2010

The social marketing company Context Optional plans to announce Monday that it has acquired unwrap inc., the makers of Buzzeo, which helps marketers create Facebook applications. It adds to the company's offerings focused on tools that engage fans, moderate conversations, and analyze data through a dashboard.

Buzzeo becomes one of several tools in the Context Optional suite that adds the ability to build applications in Facebook. There are four main tools: moderation, which helps brands manage the conversation on the Facebook page; publishing services to schedule and geographically target subscribers; applications to support contests and sweepstakes; and analytics.

The tools are part of the company's Social Marketing Suite, Facebook-focused software allowing brands to offer quizzes, videos, coupons and specials through the Facebook stream, IM sessions or photo tagging.

Facebook estimates about half of its more than 400 million active users log on to Facebook in any given day. The average subscriber has 130 friends. People spend more than 500 billion minutes per month on Facebook. And there are more than 160 million objects that people interact with on pages and in groups or events.

For Context Optional, it's all about the ability to build and integrate virtual goods and gifts and target Facebook subscribers with relevant offerings. While the company has a product road map, Kevin Barenblat, CEO and co-founder, Context Optional, declined to elaborate, but one thing's for sure -- look for more shared functions and co-branding between Buzzeo and its new parent company.

As part of the acquisition, the Buzzeo team, including co-founders Waynn Lue and Joshua Reeves, will join the Context Optional group and take on leadership roles in product development, marketing and engineering for the Social Marketing Suite.

Buzzeo will remain a stand-alone product, offered to customers free of charge. The company has worked with Ben & Jerry's and Gold's Gym on Facebook and enabled a variety of social shopping experiences for sellers on CafePress and Zazzle.